The Wigan Casino was a nightclub in Wigan, England. Operating between 1973 and 1981,^[1] it became known as a primary venue for Northern soul music. It carried forward the legacy created by clubs such as the Twisted Wheel in Manchester, the Chateau Impney (Droitwich), the Catacombs (Wolverhampton) and the Golden Torch (Tunstall, Stoke-on-Trent). It remains one of the most famous clubs in Northern England.^[2] In 1978, the American music magazine Billboard voted Wigan Casino 'The Best Disco in the World', ahead of New York's Studio 54.^[3]

This England, a TV documentary about the Wigan Casino, was filmed in 1977. Russ Winstanley and Dave Nowell wrote a history of the club, Soul Survivors, The Wigan Casino Story, which was published in 1996. A stage play by Mick Martin about the Wigan Casino years, Once upon a time in Wigan, debuted in February 2003 at the Contact Theatre in Manchester and has since toured nationally.

Wigan Casino Northern Soul Bag. This was my personal bag from my days of attending Wigan Casino and other Northern Soul nighters and dayers around the country. You will not find many of these with anniversary and other badges knocking around. The Wigan Casino was a nightclub in Wigan, England.Operating between 1973 and 1981, it became known as a primary venue for Northern soul music. It carried forward the legacy created by clubs such as the Twisted Wheel in Manchester, the Chateau Impney , the Catacombs (Wolverhampton) and the Golden Torch (Tunstall, Stoke-on-Trent).

History[edit]

Wigan Casino was the name of the last incarnation of a Wigan ballroom called the Empress. Local DJ Russ Winstanley and Wigan Casino manager Mike Walker approached lease owner Gerry Marshall to run all-nighters. Walker brought Winstanley, who had a DJ set at the local rugby club, to the Casino Club. At 2 am on Sunday 23 September 1973, Wigan Casino started its first-ever Northern soul all-nighter, with Winstanley as the DJ. After Winstanley and his helper Ian Fishwick, Kev Roberts was the third DJ at Casino all-nighters, who was quickly joined by Richard Searling^[4] Soul performers that performed there include Jackie Wilson, Edwin Starr and Junior Walker.

Listen to WIGAN CASINO (Live) Recording 7th June 1975 by Cris Walker Allen (Dr Crypt) for free. Follow Cris Walker Allen (Dr Crypt) to never miss another show. Sign Wigan Casino Dw Stadium up to brand-new casino VegasLuck and make a deposit to get your hands on 50 wager-free spins. Each individual promotion will come with its own set of specific significant terms and conditions (the “ Significant Terms ”) in addition to these Standard Promotional Terms and Conditions (“ Standard Promo Terms ”).

Young people from all over the UK regularly attended Wigan Casino to hear the latest northern soul artists and to dance. There were long queues to get in. The second dance floor, Mr M's, stayed open until 6 am and played oldies songs from a variety of DJs including Dave Evison and Steve Whittle. All-nighters generally ended with three songs that became known as the '3 before 8': 'Time Will Pass You By' by Tobi Legend, 'Long After Tonight Is All Over' by Jimmy Radcliffe, and 'I'm on My Way' by Dean Parrish.^[5] Parrish is still active on the Northern soul circuit.

Wigan Casino's 500th all-nighter was held on Saturday 16 May 1981, from midnight to 8 am. Over the eight years it was open, it had over four million people through its doors.^[6]

Wigan Council owned the building and wanted to extend the nearby Civic Centre, but short of funding, it never went ahead.^[6] The club closed on 6 December 1981; that final night of Wigan Casino in its Northern soul state was DJ'd by Winstanley, and the '3 before 8' were played three times consecutively at the end of the night. The crowd refused to leave; according to Winstanley, to 'break this spell of hysteria', he picked a 7' at random from his box and played that. This final Wigan Casino song became one of the most famous Northern soul songs of all time, Frank Wilson's 'Do I Love You (Indeed I Do)'.^{[citation needed]} Annual reunions are held in Wigan hosted by the original DJs.^{[citation needed]}

The Casino is commemorated with a Blue plaque, which was installed in 2014, marking the place where the doors to the club once stood.^[7]

The site is now occupied by the Grand Arcade shopping centre, which pays homage to the club with its Casino Café.^[5]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

Wigan Casino Top 100 Songs

1. ^'Archived copy'. Archived from the original on 22 April 2016. Retrieved 14 April 2019.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
2. ^'BBC Manchester - Clubbing - Wigan Casino'. BBC.co.uk. Retrieved 3 June 2015.
3. ^'Wigan Casino voted greatest disco in the world'. The Guardian. 15 June 2011.
4. ^'Chris Hunt Wigan Casino'. Chrishunt.biz. 23 September 1973. Retrieved 3 June 2015.
5. ^ ^ab'Casino'. www.grand-arcade.co.uk. Archived from the original on 15 May 2013. Retrieved 15 November 2019.
6. ^ ^ab'Another spin for the Casino'. BBC Local. 9 August 2007.
7. ^'What Does A Blue Plaque For Wigan Casino Mean, Anyway?'. Clash. 9 September 2014.

Further reading[edit]

• Shaw, Dave. Casino. Bee Cool Publishing, ISBN0-9536626-2-4.

Wigan Casino Top 100 Hits

External links[edit]

• For Dancers Only The story of Wigan Casino by Chris Hunt, published in Mojo Collections magazine, Spring 2002

Coordinates: 53°32′47.24″N2°37′44.48″W / 53.5464556°N 2.6290222°W

'Skiing In The Snow' is an Americansoul song which became adopted by the Northern soul subculture in the UK, written by Sandy Linzer and Denny Randell.^[1][2]

Wigan Casino Top 100 Players

Originally recorded in October 1964^[1] in a surf style by American group The Beach Girls (also known as The Rag Dolls), their version was released on Dynovox Records^[3] in February 1965 but failed to chart.^[4] The group consisted of Jean Thomas, Mickie Harris and Susan Lewis.^[5]

The Invitations version[edit]

Wigan Casino Top 100 Games

The song was then re-recorded a year later by American group The Invitations in a blacksoul style, and released on Dynovoice Records (an alias of Dynovox) a year later. This version also failed to chart.^[6]

The song was then forgotten and became 'rarer than a green dog',^[7] according to one source 'no one had actually seen a copy or heard it', and it was only 'rumoured to exist'.^[8] It is unclear whether it ever obtained any radio play at the time of its release.

In the 1970s, this song was rediscovered by Ian Levine while in Miami and became an extremely popular dance track in Northern soul clubs in England, and was subsequently re-pressed in the UK unofficially.^[9] Even though the song was nominally about skiing, many of those in the clubs interpreted some of the lyrics as drug references, perhaps a reason for its popularity.^[2]

The Invitations (at the time of the song's release) consisted of Roy Jolly (lead singer), Billy Morris, Robert Rivers, and Wilson 'Gary' Gant.^[10] The group also recorded 'What's Wrong With Me Baby', 'Written On The Wall', and 'Hallelujah',^[4] none of which were successful, however 'What's Wrong With Me Baby' did receive some radio play in the US on release^[11][12] and was also used in the Northern soul subculture in the UK later on.^[13]

Wigan's Ovation version[edit]

In an attempt to capitalise on the song's popularity in the Northern soul subculture and 'put Northern Soul on the music map for the industry',^[14]Russ Winstanley met up with a pop group from Wigan called Sparkle,^[15][7] who renamed themselves Wigan's Ovation and covered the song (with slightly modified lyrics) in 1975.^[9]

On 20 March 1975, the band performed the song on Top of the Pops, and went on to perform on the show 13 times.^[5] They appeared in baggy trousers decorated with Northern soul badges, and the performance was widely derided as 'uncool' and 'an imitation'.^[9]

This recording was extremely controversial and was widely panned by those in the Northern Soul scene, who described it as a 'terrible cover version of The Invitations' classic', 'trash', 'bad for Northern Soul',^[14] '[an] embarrassing novelty single',^[16][17] 'crassly commercial', 'selling out',^[18] 'horrible', 'even worse than Footsee',^[7] 'dire', 'awful',^[17] 'annoying', 'our Vietnam flashback moment', and 'a fucking travesty'.^[9] 'Furious' enthusiasts were 'disgusted'^[7] that their cover had been blown and particularly disliked the fact that the band's name contained the name of their town,^[16][19] as for many people this performance was their first encounter with the subculture which had previously been kept underground,^[14] and many in the industry see the release of this record as a pivotal moment in the decline of Northern soul (the night of the Top of the Pops airing was described as 'the night that Wigan Casino died').^[9] Indeed, soon after the release of this record, attendance at the Wigan Casino rapidly increased forcing the venue to stop accepting new members,^[20] many of those attending only recently becoming aware of the subculture through the television broadcast.^[7]

Stuart Maconie described the song as 'a bland, modernised, easier to licence version of a classic Northern tune originally by US artists', and said it 'really stuck in the purists' craw even then'.^[17]

Even though the recording 'horrified the purists',^[14] the song entered the UK singles chart and reached a peak of number 12 on 15 March 1975, and stayed in the chart for 10 weeks.^[21]

The band had later hits with 'Per-so-nal-ly' and 'Super Love', reaching 38 and 41 in the UK charts respectively, however this did not stop the band splitting up in 1976. The band then reformed in 1977 and continued performing until the suicide of their manager in 1984.^[5][22]

Chart performance[edit]

References[edit]

1. ^ ^abPETER., DUNBAVAN (2017). AVID'S GUIDE TO SIXTIES SONGWRITERS. [S.l.]: AUTHORHOUSE. ISBN9781524633462. OCLC986844428.
2. ^ ^ab'Red Bull Music Academy'. daily.redbullmusicacademy.com. Retrieved 2017-09-03.
3. ^'Spotlight winners of the week'. Billboard. Nielsen Business Media, Inc. 1965-02-06. p. 14. ISSN0006-2510.
4. ^ ^abJohn., Clemente (2000). Girl groups : fabulous females that rocked the world. [Place of publication not identified]: Diane Pub Co. ISBN9780756783181. OCLC947759354.
5. ^ ^abcKnudsen, Anders (2015-12-08). 'Random Obscurities: 'Skiing In The Snow' w/ Wigan's Ovation and The Beach Girls'. FMS. Retrieved 2017-09-02.
6. ^Productions, Global Dog (2006). '45 Discography for Dyno-Vox/DynoVoice Records'. www.globaldogproductions.info. Retrieved 2017-09-02.
7. ^ ^abcdeFrank., Broughton (2006). Historia del DJ : anoche un DJ salvó mi vida (in Spanish). Brewster, Bill, López Cabrera, Beatriz, McLaren, James. Teià: Ma Non Troppo. p. 111. ISBN9788496222588. OCLC71256259.
8. ^Constantine, Sweeney, Elaine, Gareth (2013). Northern Soul: An Illustrated History. Random House. p. 81. ISBN9780753549674.
9. ^ ^abcdeStuart, Cosgrove (2016). Young soul rebels : a personal history of northern soul ([North American version] ed.). Edinburgh: Birlinn. ISBN9781846973338. OCLC949753813.
10. ^'Wilson Gant'. Dac-Bag Productions. 2006. Archived from the original on 2007-02-06. Retrieved 2017-08-03.
11. ^'Top R&B Jockeys' Pick-of-the-week'. Billboard. 1965-10-16. p. 59. ISSN0006-2510. Retrieved 2017-09-03.
12. ^'Top R&B Jockeys' Pick-of-the-week'. Billboard. 1965-10-30. p. 59. ISSN0006-2510. Retrieved 2017-09-03.
13. ^Keith., Rylatt (2001). Central 1179 : the story of Manchester's Twisted Wheel Club. Scott, Phil. London: Bee Cool Pub. ISBN9780953662630. OCLC263580427.
14. ^ ^abcd'Northern Soul: Living for the Weekend'. Northern Soul: Living for the Weekend. 2014-07-25. 40 minutes in. BBC. BBC Four. Retrieved 2017-09-02. 'Wigan's Ovation's cover version of a rare Northern Soul song became a major top 20 chart hit in 1975. I think Wigan's Ovation's Skiing In The Snow was bad for Northern Soul. Terrible cover version of The Invitations' classic. That was when it was no longer underground. Everybody knew about it. 'I was into Bay City Rollers last year. Now I'm into Northern Soul'. You'd be speaking to work colleagues, they'd be saying, 'What are you into?', you'd say, 'Northern Soul', and they'd go, 'Oh, like Wigan's Ovation?'... 'No! How many times do I have to explain, that's as far away as it can possibly be?'... It horrified the purists. None of us at the venues were very happy about it, but what it did, it put Northern Soul on the music map for the industry.'
15. ^'Wigan Casino'. www.northernsoultrain.co.uk. Retrieved 2017-09-02.
16. ^ ^ab'Northern Renaissance'. Greg Wilson. 2013-11-21. Retrieved 2017-09-02.
17. ^ ^abcStuart., Maconie (2004). Cider with roadies. London: Ebury. p. 70. ISBN9780091891152. OCLC56450411.
18. ^Axel., Schildt (2006). Between Marx And Coca-cola : Youth Cultures in Changing European Societies, 1960-1980. Siegfried, Detlef. New York, NY: Berghahn Books. p. 318. ISBN9780857456854. OCLC875099006.
19. ^Brown, Chris (2001). Bovver. London: Blake. ISBN9781903402177. OCLC45647868.
20. ^'Manchester Music in the 1970's'. www.prideofmanchester.com. Retrieved 2017-09-03.
21. ^'skiing-in-the-snow full Official Chart History Official Charts Company'. Official Charts Company. Retrieved 2017-09-02.
22. ^McClusky, Jim. 'WIGANS OVATION - HOMEPAGE'. www.angelfire.com. Retrieved 2017-09-02.